April 22 – May 6, 2014
Finally! After what has seemed like months and months
of talking, discussing, planning, debating, and preparing, we are off to
Alaska! We departed our slip in LaConner
marina at 0700 on Tuesday, April 22, along with our travel buddies, Dick and
Becky Walsh and Laurie Faaberg (Becky’s sister) onboard Ella Marie. They travel with pets as well. Gus an older golden retriever, and Baxter, a
feisty rat terrier. Dick, Becky, and
Laurie have been boaters for many years and have travelled all through the Gulf
Islands and to Desolation Sound, but have not yet been to Alaska. Way back last fall, as the cruising season
was coming to an end, they started talking about buddy boating to Alaska with
us. What a great idea!! It will be a different trip for us, since
we’ve not travelled with dogs who HAVE to go ashore every 12 hours or so, or with
a boat that travels slower than we do. Ella Marie likes 7 knots an hour versus the
speedy 8 – 8.5 knots at which Cosmo Place has cruised in previous trips.
Knut and Gerry have
travelled to Alaska many times and when they travel through Canada they don’t
worry about the amount of beer, wine, and gin on the boat when they clear
customs. They report what they carry and
have not had a problem with Canadian customs, even though they’re over the
published limits. So when we stopped at
Pender Harbor to clear customs that’s exactly what we did. I had called ahead, since we have Nexus, an
add-on to our passports that allows easier clearance, and assumed we would do a
simple stop at the dock, wait 10 minutes, and be on our merry way. Nope!
The customs agents (3 of them) were there and took about 30 minutes to
go through our boats. One of them said
that if the customs officers had not been at Pender, we would have had to go to
Sydney Harbor…definitely out of our way!
We cleared easily, even though we had extra booze and learned some
things: (1) be honest about what we’re
carrying. Since we’re in transit they
really didn’t care that we had lots of beer, wine, and gin; (2) they’re not
worried about small amounts of “pits, eyes, and seeds” except apples. I could have had more citrus and potatoes and
it would not be a problem; and (3) they were perfectly happy reading info off
my laptop! I’ll quit printing stuff out.
Our first night’s moorage
was at Ganges Harbor in the Gulf Islands.
(We had been here before in 2010 with Donald and Dorothy Peterson.) Ella Marie introduced us to the public dock,
right at the foot of Mouat’s Department Store and just down the street from the
grocery store. Ganges is a real working
town with a bit of a touristy flair to it, so the shops are interesting to
wander through.
Wednesday, April 23, we
slipped the lines at noon, since we had a short run to Silva Bay, and wanted to
time our passage through Gabriola Passage for calm water. We like this route better than going through
Dodd Narrows and Nanaimo, especially since we didn’t need to provision. Gabriola Passage was the first of many such
places where we must pay attention to the speed of the water through this
little pinch down area. We went through
with 3 – 3.5 k/h water flowing against and “squirreled around” (not a nautical
term, but you get the idea) a little bit, but had no difficulty. We arrived at Dick’s uncle’s dock in Silva
Bay about 1615 and met Dick and Colleen Hardman, who spend their summers
here. Their winter home is in Blaine,
although they lived in Southern California for many years. They own a small acreage with lovely water
views and a dock big enough for several boats.
Free moorage and free power! Just
lovely!
Our next destination was
across the Strait of Georgia to Westview Marina in Malaspina Strait. Thanks to our new Sirius satellite weather
system, we learned that the buoy at Halibut Bank, in the middle of the Strait
of Georgia, was reporting wind at 18 k/h with gusts up to 23 k/h and waves
4’. That’s too much for us! We could go but it would be a miserable 4
hours across a big, open body of water.
We decided to take a “weather day”.
We’d been to Silva Bay
several times previously and we were ready to show Becky, Laurie, and Dick the
sights. We followed the forest trail to
the Silva Bay marina and found the old, rusted car along the way. Always good for a photo! After lunch, bread baking, and a quick nap,
we were off to Drumbeg Park and a view of Gabriola Passage from land. This longer walk gave us a good stretch of
our legs and gave us lovely views. In the photo below we’re standing near the
pass we had just come through the day before.
Jerry pointed out that a submarine IS NOT surfacing behind us! What you see is a channel marker.
Friday, April 25, the
weatherman gave us a good report so off we went, bound for Westview Marina, at
Powell River. Although we had 1’ chop
and quartering seas, the transit wasn’t too uncomfortable for us, although
Smokey did complain a bit. When it’s the
least bit rolly, she’s in my lap.
We had a beautiful, sunny
cruise up Malaspina Strait and arrived at Westview Marina at 1335, an easy
day. Westview is the town that supports
the huge pulp mill at Powell River. Once
again we had the opportunity to go for a good hike, so Jerry and I walked to
the pulp mill and back, about 5 miles.
The trail uses an old railroad bed, that was part of the mill operation,
but is now a city park. Along the trail,
we found old logging machinery and signs explaining their uses.
We eventually arrived at the
bay in front of the pulp mill and could get a close hand look at these old ships
used as a breakwater. We could hear
seals barking in the distance but could never see them. Perhaps they were asleep in the master cabin
of one of these old boats! We were
amazed at the noise as we approached the Powell River pulp mill and wondered
what it must have been like to listen to that 24/7! We would have liked to walk to the old town
site, but simply ran out of time. Dinner
was calling! We ate at a restaurant called
“Snickers”. We thought the name might
imply one of our favorite candy bars, but it turned out to be a Greek restaurant
and was delicious! We had huge servings
and leftovers for a couple of days.
Saturday, April 26 we
departed Westview Marina at 0900 and were excited to be cruising north
today. We would pass through Yaculta
Rapids, the first in the series of five through the “back way” and planned to
moor that night in Big Bay. If you’ve
heard our stories of our first trip to Alaska, you’ll know that we took this
same route and were surprised there were 5 rapids ahead of us, not the 3 we
thought! Yikes!! We were ready this time and had calculated
and plotted and reviewed and had this first set all figured out. We went through Yaculta with 3.5 k/h against
us (according to our software) but were speeding along at 8.3 k/h at 1070
RPM. The current was definitely with
us. We saw a few small overfalls and
eddies but nothing to be worrisome.
We moored at Big Bay marina
about 1500 and found the docks to be absolutely empty. What once was a thriving resort has become a
lonely town dock. Just next door, in the
bay, was a beautiful private fishing camp and marina - one of several along this stretch of
water. Gus and Jasper loved getting off
the boat and onto the grass…what good sports they are!
Sunday, April 27 was our
first really challenging day, in which we passed through the next four sets of
rapids…Gillard, Dent, Green Point, and Whirlpool. Again we did lots of calculating and
discussing and arrived at perfect transits through all of them. The only hitch was that we had to “kill some
time” in Cordero Channel as we approached Green Point Rapids. In a boat, one cannot pull over to the curb,
so we stopped in the middle and turned off the engine. We bobbed for quite awhile as Ella Marie
cruised back up the channel to look at a fish farm in Phillips Arm. Soon she was back and decided to tie to a big
buoy on at a log collection point. We
drifted over to her and eventually side tied to her to wait. What a good idea! Laurie had just baked a bumble berry
pie. Having pie and coffee made the time
pass a little easier!
We anchored in Douglas Bay,
Forward Harbor, at 1620, a run of almost 7.5 hours. This was our first anchorage so Gus and
Baxter, along with Becky, Laurie, and Dick piled into their dinghy to go to
shore. Fortunately there was a nice
little beach for them to use and they were soon back on Ella Marie. The crew came over for dinner and while we
visited we had a little rain squall followed by a lovely rainbow that reached
from one side of the harbor to the other.
Sadly, no one wanted to go diving for the pot of gold.
Monday, April 28, we hauled
the anchor at 0630 to make our way out to Johnstone Strait. This is another body of water that can be
“snotty” (yep, that’s an official boating term!) so we planned to head for Echo
Bay in the Broughton’s as soon as we could.
Echo Bay had lots of empty dock space, but by the middle of June I’m
sure it will be hopping. This is a
popular destination for summer cruisers, as Pierre, the owner, goes all out to
host BBQ’s and potlucks, and even does a weekly pig roast in his “Weber
5000”!
Soon after we arrived, the
sailboat “Orion”, hailing from Rio de Janerio, moored next to us. We invited the 3 crew over for a chat and
found out that Marcia (married to a Canadian and living in Vancouver) was
sailing with her brother, Kiko, and his girlfriend Mary on the family’s
sailboat. Kiko had sailed it from Rio to
Galveston, TX, and then had it trucked to Bellingham, WA! Wow!
There’s always some out there more adventurous than we! Marcia spoke great English and Kiko and Mary
weren’t far behind here, although their first language was Portuguese.
We spent two nights at Echo
Bay, waiting for weather to clear ahead of us around Cape Caution. The West Sea Otter buoy told us that the
winds were 27 gusting to 31 kph and the seas were 10.8 feet. Yikes!!
On Monday, we all did “boat chores” and picture taking. There’s not much of any place to walk at this
time of year, so we didn’t manage another hike.
The little grassy spot at the top of the ramp was the perfect place to walk
the dogs until we spotted a big black bear up there, lounging in the
grass! He/she seemed quite at home and
all that matted grass we saw was due to this napping bear! Pierre arrived from Nanaimo late afternoon,
mowed the grass, and ran the bear off.
Poor bear…lucky dogs! Pierre told
us that the Broughton’s resident historian, Billy Proctor, is doing well and
will turn 80 this year. He still spends
winters collecting logs and delivering them to buyers in the area. According to Pierre, Billy made $80,000 doing
this last year! Amazing.
If you have traveled with
us, you know that Jerry and I do a lot of verbal processing: debating, comparing, discussing, and finally
concluding which route to take or time to depart. I hope that most people find it interesting
and maybe even comforting to hear how we arrive at our decisions and maybe even
participate in the process. I hope
that’s true of Becky, Laurie, and Dick and that we’re not driving them crazy! When we left Echo Bay on Wednesday, April 30,
our destination was Skull Cove (what a lovely name), just before rounding Cape
Caution. We exited the Broughton’s down
Wells Passage and once we were in Queen Charlotte Strait, we realized that it
was calm enough to proceed around Cape Caution to Fury Cove. So, what was originally to be a 7-hour cruise
became an 11-hour run to Fury Cove. It
was a beautiful cruise, however and when we dropped anchor we were in sunshine
and 67 degrees! Wonderful!
Fury Cove is a popular
stopping point for cruisers but there were only 3 boats anchored here: us, Ella Marie, and a beautiful old wooden
boat, Catalyst. The Catalyst’s captain
dropped some passengers on the little sandy beach to do some exploring and then
came over for a chat. He told us that
Catalyst originally belonged to the University of Washington’s chemistry
department. It was built in 1932 and
back then the university did not have an oceanography program! Now the ship is hired out for natural history
tours. The captain said this was his
22nd trip to Alaska (destination Juneau).
Last spring when he anchored in Fury Cove he saw a brown bear sow and 3
cubs on the very beach where Becky, Laurie, and Dick had just parked to let the
dogs off!
Thursday, May 1, we pulled
the anchor at 0750 to continue on our journey and another moorage, Shearwater
Marina. We’ve stopped here several times
in our journeys and are rather ambivalent about this spot. They have a decent dock, power, water,
grocery store, hotel, and restaurant, but everything is outrageously
expensive. We had cold sandwiches and
drinks and spent $40! Hmmm. Perhaps we’ll bypass this little bandit spot
on our way south in August. Because of
the plentiful water and warm weather we did take the time to wash the salt off
the boat. It was pretty bad and the
windows were a tragedy.
Friday, May 2, was a
gorgeous morning so we were off early to make our destination of Khutze
Inlet. Once again, we debated,
discussed, and reviewed our notes about which way to go. Should we take the quieter Reid Passage with
its narrows or the potentially rougher, but shorter route through Millbanke
Sound? The shorter route won out, after
Jerry talked to the captain of a tug and tow who knew that the water in
Millbanke Sound was “calm”. Soon we were
going rolly-polly toward Finlayson Channel and happy that we’d taken the
shortcut.
We arrived at one of our
favorite anchorages in Khutze Inlet about 1515 and found the inlet to be windy
and white-cappy. In spite of that, we
anchored on the sandbar, put out plenty of chain, and settled in. The Ella Marie crew were soon headed to shore
to let the dogs “do their thing” and we looked at Smokey and were grateful for
her little sedentary habits!
Our Khutze Inlet anchorage
never really calmed down and we had a noisy, bouncy night. Because our cabin is in the bow, we heard every wave that hit the hull. Jerry
sleeps through this a lot better than I do, so I didn’t get much sleep that
night. I should have moved to the salon
and slept in the sleeping bag but hated to leave my warm, cozy bed!
Saturday, May 2, we awoke to
lots of wind blowing right down the inlet and a stronger tidal ebb! I’m sure we were pulled out to the end of our
anchor chain but our anchor held us well.
Ordinarily we don’t use our headsets to pull the anchor, but this
departure was a challenge! I had to
drive the boat forward into the current so Jerry could pull the chain up. Wow!
Can you see the log poking
out of the water in the photo? That deadhead
has been parked at the end of the sandbar in Khutze Inlet for years. Two years ago, we could not spot it, but this
year it was very obvious! It would ruin
our whole day to hit that thing!
Saturday’s cruise took us
past Butedale, the site of an old fish cannery along Princess Royal
Channel. Here’s the Wikipedia info:
Butedale is a ghost town that was
founded on Princess
Royal Island, British
Columbia in 1918 as a fishing, mining and logging camp. Initially the salmon cannery was established by
Western Packers, which was purchased and operated by the Canadian Fishing
Company until it ceased operating in the 1950s. At its peak the summertime
population of Butedale was over 400 people.
There is a small dam that
generates power from Butedale Lake immediately behind the town. Impressive Butedale Falls flows out
of the lake into the ocean immediately to the right of the wharves. The
Butedale Founders Association talked about restoring the town but it is quickly
falling to ruin.
As we cruised by we could
see a light on in one of the buildings so the longtime caretaker is still there
keeping the power on! We’ve never
stopped here…looks rather unsafe!
Today’s cruise brought us
taller mountains with more snow on them, and more cascades and waterfalls along
the shores. During the summer this route
is full of cruise ships but we didn’t see one, just tugs with tows of logs.
Saturday night we anchored
in Lowe Inlet, Nettle Basin, another favorite stop along Grenville Channel. In previous Augusts, when the salmon were
running, we watched the bears fish in the cascade at the head of the
inlet. We were too early for the salmon
run today, but did sit and watch a black bear hunt for dinner.
We anchored close to shore
in the outflow of the stream and hoped the current would overcome the strong NE
winds. We didn’t want another sleepless
night like the previous one. We set the
anchor well and put out LOTS of chain, so we knew we’d stay put. We used our Nobeltec software on the laptop
to keep an eye on our position and here’s what it showed us. We hovered in that 9 o’clock position all
night. Again, it was a noisy night, but
I was smarter this time and moved to the sleeping bag in the salon!
Sunday, May 4, we underway again
by 0705 and, like the horse headed to the barn, we were excited to be headed
for Prince Rupert. The approach to the
port quickly became full of interesting boats.
This Canadian Coast Guard cutter quickly passed by us.
We’ve seen this tugboat
“Western Navigator” many times in our travels and, using our Raymarine AIS info
learned that he was headed for Seattle and was due to arrive on May 6…just 2
days from now!
It was quite dramatic to
approach Prince Rupert and cruise past the two huge ship terminals. I snapped some photos of the ships as we went
by:
Monday, May 5, we had
originally planned to cruise from Prince Rupert to Foggy Bay, just across Dixon
Entrance. Once we were out in open
water, just past the beautiful Green Island Light, we realized that the water
was totally flat and we decided to make the run to Ketchikan! This was the smoothest crossing we’ve
experienced!
As we cruised past Dundas
Island, we joined by a pod of Pacific white-sided dolphins. The video I took is much easier to see than
this snapshot, but I hope you get the idea.
We probably had 10 dolphins swimming around us and they joined us for
about half an hour. We assumed that they
were chasing a school of fish but they seemed to be quite playful as they
darted back and forth under the boat. Very
fun to watch!
Ketchikan soon came into
sight. Only one cruise ship! This sweet little town was a welcome sight
indeed. We forged on to Bar Harbor marina,
well north of the cruise ship docks along Tongass Channel. It is here that we were close to the
Laundromat (yep, shades college days!) and the lovely Safeway grocery
store. Although we weren’t out of much,
it was nice to get some fresh produce.
Since we’re on foot for our expeditions, we use a collapsible hand truck
to haul stuff. The Walsh’s found a
collapsible little canvas wagon that serves the same purpose. In the photo Dick and Jerry are ahead of us
on the way to the Laundromat.
So, that brings you up to
date. It is now the middle of the
afternoon on May 6 and we are planning to continue on our cruise tomorrow
morning. We will explore Behm Canal and
then make our way to Petersburg. We hope to be there about May 13. We’re looking forward to the Norwegian
Festival there and will be in port for several days.
Our first guests arrive on
May 18 in Petersburg…Lewis and Bonnie Smith, our Texas friends.
As always, we hope you are
well and sure wish you could join us!
As always "funny, interesting & cool" and truly look forward to your blogs. Thanks
ReplyDeleteThanks for taking us with you. Great pictures! May calm seas and sunny weather be with you.
ReplyDeleteJerry and gail